Shorthand (Pitman, Gregg, Teeline) Search Shorthand Shorthand is any system of rapid handwriting which can be used to transcribe the spoken word. Shorthand systems use a variety of techniques including simplifying existing letters or characters and using special symbols to represent phonemes, words and phrases. A brief history of shorthand systems Ever since the invention of writing scribes have used various techniques to enable them to take notes quickly and efficiently. The Ancient Egyptians devised two scripts, Hieratic and Demotic , as alternatives to their complex Hieroglyphic script, which was used mainly for monumental inscriptions. Both Hieratic and Demotic worked on the same principles as the Hieroglyphs but the symbols were considerably simplified. During the 4th century BC, the Greeks devised a number of symbol systems which reduced letters to a single stroke and which could also be used to represent common words, suffixes and prefixes. Such systems are generally referred to as stenography (narrow writing), brachygraphy (short writing) or tachygraphy (swift writing). Their purpose was to make writing more compact and/or faster.

One shorthand system popular with the Romans was Tironian Notes or Notae Tironianae, which was invented by Cicero's secretary Tiro in order to record Cicero's speeches. It used a combination of simplified letters and special symbols and was used in Europe in various forms until the Middle Ages. During the Han Dynasty (207BC - 220AD) the Chinese devised two methods of rapid writing known as xíngshū (running script) and căoshū (draft script). In the Running script some of the strokes that make up characters are joined and others are left out. In the Draft script each character is written with a single continuous stroke and there is considerable variation in how this is done. As a result, the Draft script is very difficult to read without special training. Attempts have been made to standardise the way the characters are written in the Draft script but they have not met with popular acclaim. Modern shorthand systems There are a number of different shorthand systems currently in use. The most popular ones include: Pitman Shorthand Pitman Shorthand was devised by Sir Isaac Pitman (1813-1897) and was first published in 1837.

Over the years is has been gradually improved and has been also adapted for 15 different languages. The system was widely used in the UK and USA by secretaries, reporters and writers, but lost popularity with the invention of pocket tape recorders. Notable features Pitman is phonetic: it records the sounds of speech rather than the spelling. For example, the sound [f] in form, elephant and rough is written in the same way for each word. Vowel sounds are optional and are written with small dots, dashes or other shapes next to the main strokes. This helps increase writing speed because most words can be identified from their consonants only. The thickness, length and position of the strokes are all significant. There are many special abbreviations and other tricks to increase writing speed. The record for fast writing with Pitman shorthand is 350 wpm during a two-minute test by Nathan Behrin in 1922. Pitman consonants Sample text in Pitman 'Translation' All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) Gregg Shorthand Gregg was invented by John Robert Gregg (1867-1948) and was first published in 1888. Since then many different versions have appeared, including some for languages other than English. Gregg is still used, particularly in the USA. Notable features Gregg is phonetic: it records the sounds of speech rather than the spelling. For example, the sound [f] in form, elephant and rough is written in the same way for each word. Vowels are written as hooks and circles on the consonants. Gregg consonants What is the fastest shorthand script: Gregg, Pitman, Teeline, or another? - Quora Quora Written Sep 21, 2014 All three shorthand systems are popular worldwide. Pitman and Teeline are relatively more common in the UK and Commonwealth countries, and the Gregg relatively more in the USA and Canada. All three are pretty much identical in speed of transcription, and much of that speed depends on the abilities of the user.

Like many other shorthand systems, all three have few strict rules on how to write it, so it's common for users to make personal adaptations for their own use, thereby helping to increase speed. Both the Pitman and the Gregg are phonetic transcription systems and uses a variety of strokes or symbols to indicate the spoken sound. Teeline, however, is a spelling-based system. The symbols are derived from the old cursive forms of the Latin letters. Unnecessary parts of the normal word spelling are stripped to increase speed. (Source: Personal training and experience of using Pitman.) Written Oct 1, 2015 Teeline has a lower top speed than the other two, mostly because it’s a mostly alphabetically-based system which does not ‘compress’ words as strongly as the others do at their upper levels. Gregg shorthand comes in various editions such as pre-Anniversary, Anniversary, Simplified, and Series 90. These differ in their trade-off between memory load and speed. In general, earlier editions required you to learn many more individual-word abbreviations and phrases but had higher top speeds, while later editions were faster to learn but the maximum attainable speed was lower.

This generally corresponded with a changing focus from court reporting and journalism (where speed was of the essence and the goal was often to take shorthand as fast as someone spoke) to commerce (where the secretary would take dictation from her boss, whom she could ask to slow down, or listen to on tape which she could pause). I don’t know as much about Pitman but I believe that there are also various editions with similar speed-versus-memory-load tradeoffs. From what I have heard, Gregg and Pitman were very comparable in terms of speed; which one was faster would depend on which study you read, which would often depend on who had financed the study…. So, in terms of speed ‘Gregg and Pitman’ (together) > Teeline (and other alphabetic methods that used simplified strokes) > Forkner (and other methods that used mostly normal letters but removed some for speed). There were also many many other methods developed over the years (including several which bore the name ‘Pitman’, even), often claiming to be faster than the two big ones (‘Eclectic Shorthand’ is one name that comes to my mind). I’m not sure how widespread they were. Shorthand Systems HOME | Learning Shorthand | Pen vs.

Recorder | Modern Systems | Gregg Systems | Which Gregg? | Speedbuilding | Dictation | For Sale | Links | Bio Info The Different Systems of Shorthand Shorthand is a brief method of writing used to record human speech. Today, most written shorthand systems write by sound (as opposed to the actual spelling of words) where there is a symbol for each sound. In the past, some systems used arbitrary signs for individual words; no wonder theyï¿½re not in use today! There are hundreds of shorthand systems out there in a myriad of languages. In English, the systems divide into distinct types: a. Symbol systems such as Gregg, Pitman, Thomas Natural, Century 21, and Eclectic Shorthand, where sounds are generally represented by strokes which are kept as brief as possible, making them faster to write than longhand, b. Alphabetic systems such as Speedwriting, Stenoscript, Forkner, and AlphaHand, where sounds are represented by letters of the alphabet as well as a few symbols, c. Hybrid systems, such as Teeline. While Teeline is based on alphabetic characters, it appears to be much more like a symbol system since so little of each letter is written.

The Teeline system is popular in Great Britan but virtually unheard of here in the United States, and d. Machine systems which require a typewriter or a stenography machine to be written. Today, computers can take machine input and transcribe it with amazing accuracy. The Gregg alphabet is based on the oval. Size variations represent different sets of related sounds; connected hooks and circles represent the vowels. Written Gregg has a forward slope and graceful forms much like cursive handwriting. The Pitman alphabet, which is older than Gregg, is linear in form. Written Pitman looks geometric. The circle and straight lines make up the basis of its alphabet. Different pairs of sounds, represented by short and long strokes in Gregg, are represented by thick and thin strokes in Pitman. (Do not forget that steel-tipped pens, the writing implement of the day, could easily produce thickness differences with variations in pressure on the pen.

In fact, Copperplate, Roundhand, and Spencerian Scriptï¿½the methods of handwriting from back then when Pitman was developedï¿½required thick and thin strokes in order to have the correct form and beauty so students of the time had adequate practice in controlling the thickness of their pen strokes.) Pitman vowels are not connected to the shorthand outline and are indicated with dots and dashes, written after the outline is written. Position of the outline (over, on, or through the line of writing) also indicates the initial vowel sound, reducing or eliminating the need to go back and place vowel signs to many outlines. It also necessitated lined paper for writing. But by being able to drop many of the vowel signs, greater speed is achieved. Multiple forms of the same letter may indicate whether a vowel precedes or follows the first consonant. As an example (and an over-simplification), there are two forms of R, one is used when preceded by a vowel, the other when a vowel follows. Pitman, being the first widely used and extremely popular shorthand system capable of high speeds, was copied and modified by many. The Graham and Munson systems are examples of Pitman modifications.

In the late 1800s, hot debates occurred as to which systemï¿½Gregg or Pitman and its variationsï¿½was ï¿½better.ï¿½ Both systems had their unshakable proof, mostly consisting of speed contest results. In looking at these so-called proofs today, it is clear in many instances the decks were stacked in favor of one system over another. Soon after the turn of the 1900s, the shorthand machine was developed by Ward Ireland Stone. Claims of writing speeds over 500 w.p.m. on the shorthand machine were made. We know today that human ears cannot even distinguish individual words at that speed so such claims become moot. However, just to be safe, the pen writers of the day banned machines from entering speed contests. Speed contests, on two separate occasions, were dropped for many years to prevent machine writers from possibly winning. The dominance of the shorthand machine today is due to the ability of having its keystrokes transcribed via the computer for a quick turnaround of transcripts. At present, there are computer programs which transcribe human speech directly without the need for a human stenographer.

I expect, in the near future, computers will be able to transcribe human speech without the need for lengthy training periods (for the computer to recognize individual speech patterns, regional accents, and pronunciation differences) with amazing accuracy. One would expect, as well, that, some day in the not-too-distant future, the cost of such computing capabilities will drop within reach of the average consumer. Teeline Shorthand Inventor Log in Teeline System Teeline is a shorthand system accepted by the NCTJ, an organisation for journalists in the United Kingdom; however it is also easily adaptable to a variety of languages. This is why we are proud to accept learners from all parts of the world. Teeline was developed in the twentieth century by James Hill, to make learning shorthand easier. He succeeded! Our students cover the entire theory and commence their speed development journey in just 17 weeks. History of James Hill Born near Bradford, England on the 19th May 1908, he qualified as a teacher of Pitman’s Shorthand by the age of 21.

During the course of his career, James realised that, for the student of average ability, or those without a special flair for shorthand, there was too much to learn before the Pitman Shorthand system could be put into use and, therefore, interest often dwindled. Possessing a naturally inventive mind, James set about applying work-study principles to ordinary longhand. The result was a system called Boscript in 1952, taught to trainee nurses and in 1966 Teeline Shorthand was born when James was asked to take over the journalists' shorthand class at Clarendon College of FE in Nottingham. The results achieved during those early pioneering days were impressive and the system was recommended to the NCTJ in 1968. In November 1968, Harry Butler, reporting on the inaugural course, wrote: "We have on our hands a shorthand breakthrough which should solve longstanding shorthand problems ...I have never known a shorthand system which can produce such good results in so short a time." Soon after, James retired to devote his time to Teeline, and both he and his wife Constance, spent the next few years tirelessly together giving presentations to promote Teeline Shorthand.

Unfortunately James died on the 2nd June 1971. His wife Constance, a well qualified and certificated teacher of Pitman’s Shorthand herself since 1949, continued to promote Teeline Shorthand at home and abroad until her retirement. Still living in England, Mrs Hill has a keen interest in her husband’s unique system. James maintained that: "If you can write, you can write Teeline." Streamlined longhand, which is the basis of the Teeline system, shares similar principles to texting, so, our belief is: If you can text, you can learn Teeline! Click here for an example of basic Teeline . Why Teeline Shorthand and not Pitman or Gregg? Having the skill of writing shorthand has always been useful, particularly within the journalism sector. It is now also becoming widely adopted by anyone who is willing to improve their skills and note-taking abilities in order to cope with minute taking. Of the three recognised types of shorthand, Teeline is the easiest to grasp.

With the benefits of interactive online learning, and dedication to practise, OnlineShorthand.com allows you to develop your shorthand speed, to 100, 110, 120 words per minute or even faster! The Joy of Pitman Shorthand THE JOY OF PITMAN SHORTHAND Writing is an unbelievably useful tool to record and communicate ideas. It is cheap, the paper it is written on can travel large distances and is lightweight, printing allows a single book or tract to reach a large number of readers, and the written word can even survive to find generations of new readers across centuries of time. Writing and books survived even after the invention of film, radio and TV, which are much more expensive to produce for the same quantity of ideas. Only computer storage and the Internet have turned out to be faster, cheaper and easier to reproduce and spread than the printed word. However, written languages were not developed with the emphasis on speed. Writing was initially the craft of a distinct class of people, the scribes and the upper class, and they tended not to care how cumbersome their symbols were. Even the streamlined modern shapes of the Latin alphabet, developed for printing and a mass readership in the literate West, are not compact enough.

With ordinary, cursive handwriting the best speed of writing is about 35 words per minute (wpm). People, however, speak at about 150 - 180 wpm, so the scribes who needed to record important speech were faced with a physical problem of keeping up with what was said. As a result they developed alternative, quicker forms of writing, parallel to the usual full-blown form of writing (which is sometimes called longhand.) The scribes of the Roman Empire attempted to solve the problem by making heavy use of abbreviations in their notes together with special symbols, based on the method of Tiro, scribe to the orator Cicero. Even Julius Caesar knew this system himself. To this day we still use their most common abbreviations such as e.g. (Latin for "for example"), i.e. ("that is" or "in other words") and etc. (et cetera, Latin for "and so on". The & symbol also comes from the form of the word "Et"). They also used simplified strokes which were faster to write than conventional letters.

A system which uses simple symbols for letters is usually referred to as a shorthand or stenography (a word which comes from the Greek words for "close writing" or "compact writing"). If the symbols are simplified but still- recognizable letters of the alphabet, the system is more properly referred to as a system of speed writing. Pitman Shorthand: Sir Isaac Pitman (1813-1897) of England developed a system of shorthand and first presented it in 1837, which was gradually perfected and later adapted for 15 languages. The system spread to the United States through the efforts of Isaac's brother Benn, who settled in Cincinnati, Ohio. Although it was not the only shorthand system in use, it did present a number of strengths which made it vastly popular and was learned by a wide audience of writers, office secretaries and newspaper, court and governmental reporters. It was an elegant system of taking rapid notes, but this skill faded away with the advent of pocket tape recorders which could faithfully record speech. Pitman's system has a number of useful features: * It is phonetic. Using very simple strokes of the pen, sounds are written down and not the letters themselves.

The sound of the letters f ("cliff"), ph ("graph") and gh ("rough") are written exactly the same way, even though they may be spelled differently in different longhand words. * Vowel sounds are optional and are written with small dots, dashes or other shapes next to the main strokes. This saves time in writing when the consonants alone make clear what the word is. In the majority of cases, the consonants alone can clearly identify an English word. With experience, the writer recognizes when it is safe to omit the vowels. * The strokes used vary in sound depending on a number of rules. It matters whether the strokes are thick or thin and whether the first stroke of a word is above, on or through the line on the paper. Halving or doubling the length of a stroke is also significant (adding -T/D or -TR/DR/THR to the basic consonant, respectively). * The system developed a large number of "short forms". For example, the letters "th" can represent two sounds (called "unvoiced" and "voiced" th). In Pitman Shorthand they are represented by a curved stroke similar to an open bracket: ( .

The thin stroke ( represents the sound of "th" as in the words "thank" and "think", and in fact the single stroke is also used as a short form for these words. The thick stroke ( represents the sound of "th" as in the words "though" and "they"/"them" and is likewise used as the short form for those words as well. Pitman's system has a large number of rules and short-form tricks (and for the sake of shape clarity, many exceptions to these rules!). These are not difficult to learn; anybody can learn them. But practicing the system is difficult because you have to remember all the rules equally, and instantly write the correct symbol for the right sound or group of sounds. You are, in effect, learning a totally new way to write, just as difficult as your struggles to learn to read and write when you were a child -- struggles which you have probably forgotten now that it is all "second nature" to you. Building up speed can be difficult, but not impossible. At one time, shorthand was universally taught to people who wanted to be office personnel.

Some went very far with it indeed -- the world record for fast writing was with the Pitman shorthand system: 350 wpm during a two-minute test by Nathan Behrin in 1922 (according to the Guinness Book of Records). Other Systems: Mention should be made that Pitman shorthand is not the only system of shorthand around. In the United States, Gregg shorthand had surpassed Pitman in popularity. Gregg works on a totally different plan: vowels have strokes of their own and vowels and consonants are written together in words which are continuous, cursive squiggles of lines, curves and loops. The thickness of a line is uniform, and the vertical position of a stroke doesn't matter so Gregg does not need paper with printed lines for reference. The Gregg system uses a standard steno-notepad ruling of 3 lines to the inch, compared to the somewhat wider lines in Pitman of 3/8 of an inch each. In Gregg, short and long arcs represent different letters, which may cause confusion if the size is miswritten or misjudged. In Pitman, halving or doubling the size of a stroke has a more intricate meaning which cannot be confused for a different starting sound.

HOWEVER, Pitman has a similar point of confusion about thick and thin strokes, which represent close but distinct consonant sounds. These can be confused if thick strokes are miswritten as thin and vice-versa. One system of speed writing is Forkner shorthand, in which the letters of cursive handwriting are written with simplified shapes. Vowels in most cases are dispensed with or shown by marks near the written consonants, and (like other systems) there is an extensive set of abbreviations in which single letters or symbols may represent entire words, all designed to avoid ambiguity. Court reporters use stenotype machines, quickly recording sounds on a mechanical device operated by pressing several keys at a time. I will not get into a war of words over which is the "better" system, but I will merely talk about the system I know. I will willingly link to Web-pages about any alternatives to Pitman . More on Pitman (please click): The obligatory hit counter: You are reader number This page was last updated on: January 11, 2011 I wrote this page because I could find no other Web-page that explained Pitman Shorthand, just the odd business course offered here and there in the British Commonwealth.

What do you think of this skill? You have two ways of giving me feedback, by signing in in the "guestbook" (which can be read by anyone) or by e-mail ("Send me a message") which is private. Caution: leaving your E-mail address on a Web-page may mean that it will be picked up by "robot" E-mail harvesting programs. These give your E-mail to people who send "spam" E-mail advertising. You may wish to disguise your E-mail and explain to people how you are disguising it, such as substituting letters or adding "REMOVETHISPART" on the right side of the @. WHAT'S NEW: (April 2009:) Pitman for Geeks: Pitman for Geeks , a new web-page by Duncan McKenzie, talks about Pitman Shorthand and goes further than I did in explaining the elements of the method. Keyscript Shorthand: Janet Cheeseman, a qualified instructor of Pitman, has devised Keyscript Shorthand , a shorthand or more correctly a system of speed writing using the regular alphabet but inspired by the Pitman schemes for short forms and abbreviations. She offers a course, now for A$120 (Australian dollars).

(April 4, 2007:) New Link for Discussion Forum: Chris Wright has set up a Web forum focussing on Pitman New Era shorthand. Everyone is encouraged to join and discuss Pitman over there. (August 12, 2005:) Merchandise! You can buy "I Love Pitman Shorthand!" merchandise here . In theory, it is possible for me to make you ANY Pitman phrase on a T-shirt or mug if I open another Cafepress "store." (May 10, 2005:) Pitman goes galactic! The science-fiction comedy movie THE HITCH-HIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY makes use of a stylized but readable Pitman 2000 shorthand to depict the Vogon language. A book describing the making of the movie reveals this Pitman use and offers movie stills. You can read Pitman phrases like "Demolition Order," "Presidential Release Form," "Information Deleted," and "Depressed? Try Destruction Therapy!" The Pitman Training institute in Britain takes the credit for creating Pitman text seen in the film. (Nov.

2004:) A business school in South India offers a 15-day Pitman Shorthand Course on the Web , with audio. Do you prefer Gregg Shorthand? The " Shorthand Shorthand Shorthand " Web-page by Marc Semler is for you. It also has general advice on practicing any shorthand system. Shorthand - Dead Media Archive Shorthand Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination Statue of an Ancient Egyptian scribe. Contents 5.1 Works Cited Definition Shorthand is a system incorporating the use of symbols or abbreviated words to form a new written language to substitute for a traditional language using full-length words, and by doing so this saves the employer of shorthand time. Overview Throughout the years, hundreds of different shorthand systems have been developed, and all have their own unique rules. Many of the modern systems use single letters to represent similar sounding whole words. For example, the letter C would represent the word 'See', when written in shorthand. Other systems use pictures to represent words. For example, a small circle, with a larger circle encompassing it would represent the phrase 'Around the world'.

The picture method of shorthand involves much more memorization and practive for the stenographer, whereas the letter substitution system is more intuitive and would be less challenging to master. Ancient History Dating back to the inception the written word, there is archeological evidence of shorthand. From civilizations like the Greeks and Romans scribal texts and artifacts have been recovered that depict their efforts at abbreviated language. In fact, for the Greeks and Romans shorthand became the normal writing style; leaving hieroglyphics for ornamental scrolls and decoration on temple and tomb walls. The term stenography was created to refer to the art of shorthand, therefore a person who employs shorthand may be labeled a stenographer. The Ancient Egyptians placed of the scribe on an elite level and training to become one was met with extreme rigor. The scribe would, "Begin to study at five years of age. The rigours and harsh training of these young apprentices was well documented. Note the connotation of the egyptian word for teach, seba, which also means to beat." (Kreitzman) The concept of Stenography (not the writing itself) was remediated throughout history in Eastern and Western cultures.

Caligraphy has evolved as the formal, correct, way to write letters and words, whereas everyday handwriting is arguably a form of shorthand. Much like the alphabet itself, Stenography can be seen as a digital interpretation of an analog idea. During the Han Dynasty (207BCE – 220CE), the Chinese developed two forms of rapid writing known as xingshu (running script) and caoshu (grass script). Still used today, the different strokes in the former are combined and others left out whereas in the latter the entire character is written in one continuous stroke. This has made these forms of stenography incredibly difficult to read without extensive training. Over the years there has been an effort made to standardize these forms of Stenography but they have been met with a deal of opposition. This can be seen as a pop and whistle of this technology. No matter how much training in the writing one can have, every piece transcribed will be inconsistent with the others in the basic structure of the physical construction of the words themselves.

Unlike using the Western alphabet (which is standardized) to make a group of manuscripts, using xingshu and caoshu is a lot riskier because the message will fundamentally change from scribe to scribe. Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination Mandarin Caoshu. The ancient Romans also used shorthand and Stenographic techniques but in different ways. Vital military messages would be written in shorthand and, combined with Steganography (meaning "covered writing" (Dunbar), they could successfully be transmitted as far as the messenger could travel. The information would be tattooed onto the bald head of the messenger and, after the hair grew back, they would travel with a fake message to their destination. Upon arrival their heads would be shaved and the true message would remain intact. Modern Shorthand: Pitman, Gregg and Teeline Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination Gregg Shorthand. There are many forms of shorthand being used in contemporary Western culture. However, the three most used are Pitman Shorthand, Gregg Shorthand, and Teeline Shorthand. Pitman Sir Isaac Pitman in England developed Pitman Shorthand in 1837.

Over the years it has been altered and adapted into over 15 different languages, but is used mostly by secretaries in the UK and America. Acting as a remediation of the Chinese scripts, Pitman Shorthand relies heavily on the thickness, length, and placement of each stroke. This, again, has made it hard to decipher; even among other stenographers because the width of each “letter” can be contested by anyone. Because of this inconsistency, this style began to loose favor after the invention of the mini tape recorder. "It is perhaps the most rapid shorthand system and is favored by many court and convention reporters. The Pitman system makes use of shading (a line heavily drawn has a meaning different from that of the same line lightly drawn) and of differences in slope and position on a given line; it is geometric in outline and is difficult to master but makes possible very great speed." (Colombia Encyclopedia, Glatte) Gregg John Robert Gregg invented Gregg Shorthand in 1888. To this day Gregg is primarily used in the US, although it has been adapted into some other languages. Unlike the Pitman style that has characters assigned to every letter, Gregg is phonetic.

For example, form, elephant, and rough would all use the same stroke for the F sound even though they are spelled differently. Gregg "published a popular system of business shorthand that is still in use today. Its outlines are curved and natural, resembling those of ordinary script; need for lifting the pen was eliminated as much as possible, so that a cursive motion is used; there is no shading, but variation in length of line indicates variation in meaning. The outlines were scientifically worked out for simplicity and writing ease." (Colombia Encyclopedia, Leslie) Teeline Developed in 1968, Teeline shorthand was developed by James Hill, who was originally an instructor of Pitman shorthand. This system is mainly employed within the confines of The United Kingdom, and is primarily used by journalists. The Teeline system is similar to its predecessors: Pitman and Greg. (Glatte) Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination Stenography Machine. The Downfall of Shorthand: From Stenography to Phonography Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination After the invention of recorded sound, the use of shorthand went into decline. Stenography was replaced by Phonography, and later its function was replaced by the Phonograph.

As the primary function of stenography was to transcribe live testimonial, tools for recording have been able to achieve this with more efficiency, and without human error. Eventually stenography evolved into phonography, which was a more advanced version of the former. It was considered "a natural method of writing all languages by one alphabet, composed of signs which represent the sounds of the human voice;...brieder than any other system, and which speakers can be followed verbatim." (Daily Atlas) As stenography involved mechanical dexterity, and was thought to utilize the intellect, it was taught to students, and used by teachers. (Porcupines Gazette) It attempted to capture and edify aspects of oral expression, and evolved to focus on the vocal element as opposed to the spelling of the word. (Gitelman) This was due to the fact that there was no way at that point to capture certain intonations of the speaker. Although spelling out the word was a way to capture the content of vocal expression, there was no way to capture the manner in which speech was expressed. The logic of capturing oral expression was extended into the subsequent invention of the Phonoautograph. This device was invented by M.L.

Scott and purported to visibally fix sound on a tablet. This was a tool to capture the actual vocal expression, and to represent it visually. However, the difference between this and stenography lies in the fact that the sound waves were not mediates a symbolic system of letters. At the same time the sounds were able to be read as they were visually distinct, and thus they were represented. Human voice was able to be distinguished from the sound produced by musical instruments. The acoustic vocabulary of tones and frequencies were employed to show how different sounds were represented visually on the tablet. This is a remediation of stenography as it attempted to capture the ephemeral sonic event, and to represent this event visually in a semiotic system. However, stenography employed writing, and the language used was the alphabet. It relied almost exclusively on the human labor of the stenographer. The Phonoautograph relied on the interface between sound and machinery much like the camera did with visual material substrate. There was an attempt to transcribe the graphic representation of sonic waves back into words, thus mimicking the process of stenography, however, this proved to be impossible, as all words looked visually different.

“It is difficult to imagine the importance of the discovery, whether in respect it be in respect to the unimpeachable accuracy of the process, the entire absence or trouble and expense in reporting any articulate sounds, or the great saving of time, and exhausting labors of parliamentary reporters.” (Porcupine’s Gazette)The Phonograph extended the notion of converting oral experience into evidence. Today we can see how the ancient esteemed profession of the scribe has been recreated into the court reporter. Just like in antiquity, the court reporter has to be extremely skilled with their tools in order to be accurate enough to transcribe every word said while maintaining a high level of ethical pride. Their tools are also designed to copy information as fast as possible making their machine a remediation of the physical motions of the hand. We can also see traces of the ancient Roman's strategic techniques in contemporary international espionage and information transferring. Vital data has been transfered hidden in other data streams using encrypted languages and forms of digital shorthand. The Cold War can be seen as an example of the measures governments went through in order to relay a message. The United States invested millions of dollars in Stenographic techniques and technologies in order to counter Soviet transmissions and intercept some information for themselves.

In fact, this war can be seen as built upon nothing more than the fear and proper usage of Stenography. Works Cited Kreitzman, Anita. History of Shorthand. Kings Park, NY: National Court Reporters Association, 2007. Dunbar, Bret. A Detailed Look At Steganographic Techniques and Their Use in an Open-Systems Environment. Washington, DC: SANS Institue, 2002. Macanair, John. Stenography Compendized. Glasgow: British Library, 2007. shorthand." The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2008. Encyclopedia.com. (September 26, 2010). Glatte, H. Shorthand Systems of the World, 1959. Leslie, L. A. Story of Gregg Shorthand, 1964. The Daily Atlas, Volume: XII; Issue: 127: Boston, Massachusetts, 1843.

Porcupine's Gazette:The Marvels of the Nineteenth Century- Sound Recording Itself; Volume: LXII; Issue: 3189;: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1861. Winston, James. Stenography Completed. London: London, 1727. How to write faster - learn Teeline shorthand • Articulate How to write faster – learn Teeline shorthand By Matthew Stibbe on 1 February 2010 Ambitious journalism student, Alex Cooper, introduces us to Teeline Shorthand with his debut guest post for Bad Language. In this article I will go through the basic structure of Teeline Shorthand , a brief history and some tips for learning it along the way. Teeline was invented by James Hill in 1970. It is aimed at a self-taught approach and a light learning load. Perfect for people with a busy lifestyle, like myself. What exactly is Teeline? Teeline is a system of speed writing (shorthand) that uses the letters of the English alphabet already familiar to us and stream lines it. Simply think of how teenagers write text messages, commonly called “text langauge” where I’m from.

They remove the letters that are silent when sounding out a word, which are commonly vowels, for example hello is abbreviated to “hlo” and bye is shortened to “bi”. Depending on how the word sounds when spoken dictates what letters are written. Teeline works on a similar principal. Here is a shorthand quote from the book Teeline Fast, written by Ann Dix. “Tln is vry esy to lrn. We shl go to Lndn nxt wk to do sm shpng. It hs bn a brt and sny da tda. Pls pt yr mny fr th tcts in th bx.” If you are experienced in text messaging, this will be second nature to you already. By now you’re probably thinking, what’s so special about Teeline? It’s just removing letters and writing words as they sound. This is just the start, Teeline uses the basic shapes of the English alphabet letters, but they are written with more flow and curves, which makes them easier to write when taken notes at high speed. The basics of the Teeline alphabet are simple.

The shorthand version of the letter is written in the same position as its longhand counterpart when beginning a word, but as the word gets more complex following letters have to move with the flow of the previous letters. When it comes to vowels, they are written smaller than constants and have two forms. The full vowel and the indicator. Vowels are eliminated unless they are the first letter of the word or the last letter. Commonly used words such as: like, the, we, be, me etc., can be abbreviated by one letter or one stroke. These are called “Special Outlines”. When I first started researching shorthand I came across Pitman, a different flavour of shorthand. These are the two main reasons I opted for Teeline and not Pitman: Pitman was not advertised as a self-study approach unlike Teeline. Pitman uses different stroke sizes and shades. Originally designed to be written with a fountain pen. I don’t use a fountain pen. Tips for learning shorthand: Don’t try to write fast at first. Speed will come with experience. Practise every day. Its more productive to spend 30 minutes a day practising rather than 2 hours a week.

Use a comfortable pen that flows freely on the page and won’t leak ink everywhere. A sharp pencil can be used as well. Please share: Description Description The skill of shorthand writing, or stenography: writing as fast... as speech, which used to be widely taught in business and for government proceedings, and law courts. Pitman, Gregg, Teeline, Forkner, we'll talk about ANY writing system used in English. ***Posts irrelevant to shorthand, or posts not written in English, will receive a warning. Advertising, spam and scams will get the "member" banned. We have added you to the group in good faith, hoping for new "fans" of shorthand. Don't abuse it.*** My own Pitman site (with a series of YouTube videos!):

Question: Pitman, Gregg and Teeline are all forms of what type of 'writing'?
Answer: Shorthand